Having beaten Chelsea twice this season (albeit they have upped their form since then), it was sickening to watch Liverpool play so poorly for the first period. Certainly the first 10 mins. I had expected that with our cup experience, and having already won a trophy at Wembley not too long ago, we'd be ready to play! But no. We looked nervous, and unsure of what to do.
Plenty of balls not reaching our man, and Enrique in particular stood out to me to be extremely woeful. Many have blamed Spearing for that first goal, but in my mind, the culprit was Enrique. He was slow, not determined enough and gave up his ground. He cost us the 1st goal against Cardiff in similar fashion. Going forward he offered little too.
A lot of comments appear to say that Chelsea deserved to win. I strongly disagree. Chelsea were not good yesterday. We however were very poor. That's what made the difference. Chelsea were not playing good football, and without the poor defending for the first goal, a 0-0 at half time would have been a better reflection of the game.
Second half, and I expected to see improvements, but instead we continued the same way. Poor. One point that has stood out a lot to me throughout this season is the tendency for our players to hang back and pass the ball around in defence. No urgency. Yesterday, we saw the same. A goal behind, and no real desire to go and score. It wasn't until we had conceded a second, and brought Carroll on (for a very poor Spearing) that we changed.
Carroll was immense. I have not been critical of him at all this season, and I was happy to see him display his ability and value to the team. A fantastic first goal, and a great second.
We dominated the last 30+ minutes, and deservedly got the goals. Chelsea didn't 'sit back and look to the Champions League', we bossed them about and simply played better. They were trying. They changed nothing after their 2nd goal. We simply improved, and that was the difference.
That 2nd goal was just reward, and we were certain to get a 3rd. Oh, yes... well we would have. Unfortunately, as we all know... we were robbed that 2nd goal. I have no complaints at the referee (he couldn't have known for certain), but I am annoyed by the injustice of it!
This is the same Chelsea who 'scored' with the ball half a metre away from the line. John Terry admitted he knew the ball hadn't crossed the line, but joined his team mates in deceiving the ref. A total injustice. Then come the final, we actually score, and are not awarded the goal. Truly frustrating. Chelsea won twice with those decisions.
In all, a truly disappointing start to the game. 60 mins in fact! However, I strongly disagree that "chelsea deserved to win". At 2-0 down, I was just hoping to keep their score down. But things changed, and we totally dominated the last period. Deservedly scoring, and unjustly having our 2nd goal ruled out.
That changed everything. If England had lost a world cup in such fashion, the media would have gone mad. However, the day after, and still, the media ignore a perfectly good 2nd goal, and award Chelsea as if they are a fantastic team, deservedly going for their own double. They were lucky yesterday. That's all. At least acknowledge it!
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